LASER: Turning the climate threat into a story of opportunity for Los Angeles

I’m an L.A. guy, so I like to think about things in epic story
lines. And with today’s launch of EDF and
UCLA’s Luskin Center for Innovation new “LASER” maps (Los Angeles Solar & Efficiency
Report), I think we’ve got a real blockbuster on our hands.

The LASER story opens with a team of top scientists warning us of an imminent
threat – climate change – that will cause widespread disruption and human suffering
if left unmitigated.

Utilizing the groundbreaking work of Dr. Alex Hall and the UCLA
Institute for the Environment and Sustainability, the LASER maps illustrate
what climate change is going to look like in the Los Angeles region in just a
few decades.

By
mid-century, the region will experience a tripling
in the number of extreme heat days in the downtown and urban core, and a quadrupling in the number of extreme heat
days in the valleys and at high elevations.

The
plot thickens as we get a clearer sense of the communities that are most at
risk – those already dealing with bad air quality, lack of adequate green space
and tree canopy, poor access to public transit, and other challenges like high
unemployment levels, poverty and public health hazards.

This
is the part of the story where we could give up in the face of seemingly
impossible odds…but that’s not how we
roll in Los Angeles.

The
LASER maps also introduce a powerful narrative about how we can fight back by mitigating the carbon pollution driving
climate change, building community resiliency through investments in energy
efficiency and renewable energy, and seizing opportunities for economic growth that
reduce vulnerability.

Nearly 47,000 local jobs in solar panel
installation could be created if merely 10% of the rooftop
solar energy generating potential in LA County was realized.

If LA rooftops were able to capture
that 10% of solar capacity they would reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 2.5 million tons, equivalent
to taking 500,000 cars off the road annually.

Another LASER plot line involves energy efficiency, one of
the cheapest ways to reduce carbon pollution and lower utility bills at the
same time. The LASER maps show that:

Nearly 1.5 million buildings in LA
County were built before energy efficiency codes went into effect, which means…

80% of all
buildings in LA County have elevated potential for cost-saving, energy
efficiency investments.

If this were actually a Hollywood blockbuster, we would
probably cut to a final, climactic showdown and a dramatic rescue from
impending doom. But unlike Hollywood,
there is no pre-written ending to the climate crisis.

To mitigate the worst effects of climate change, and prepare
vulnerable communities for the climate impacts already on their way, we need
serious investment and deployment of clean energy and low-carbon infrastructure
– particularly in those communities that will be hit the hardest.

LASER provides tools that can help elected officials and advocates
pinpoint the communities that are most vulnerable to climate change, identify the region’s clean
energy investment potential, and then develop policies and funding mechanism to
unleash it. EDF is here to help in that
effort, and look forward to supporting our friends and allies in Los Angeles
who are working to make the clean energy potential profiled in LASER a real-life
success story.

In the end, LASER tells a tale of threat and opportunity in Los
Angeles. Now it’s time to get to work to
make sure this epic has a positive ending.

Editor’s Note: The stats in this post have been updated to reflect the newest version of the Los Angeles
Solar & Efficiency Report (LASER), a
data-driven mapping tool that can help stakeholders and local leaders understand
climate and pollution risks in their own communities.